"SUMMER LIGHTNING"

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 72, Issue 233, 1 October 1929, Page 10

"SUMMER LIGHTNING"

By

P. G. WODEHOUSE

A Humorous Sporting Serial

Specially Written for “The Wanganui CHRONICLE.”

A sharp try escaped Sir Gregory. His face had turned a deep magenta. In these affluent days of his middle age, he always looked rather like a Kegency buck WHO has done himself well for years among the flesh-pot He now resembled a negeney buck who, in addition. to being on the verge of apoplexy, has been stung in he leg by a hornet. “I will,” said the Hou. Galahad firmly. ‘‘The full, true, and complete story of the prawns, omitting nothing. ” ‘‘What was the story of the prawns my dear fellow?” asked Lord Emsworth, interested. “Never mind. t know'. And young Parsloe knows. And if Empress of Blandings is not back in her stye this afternoon, you will find it in my book.” ~ . .. “But I keep telling you, ’ cried the suffering baronet, “that 1 know nothing whatever about your pig. > “Ha!” ... ‘‘l’ve not seen the animal since last year’s agricultural show. ’ “Ho!” , “I didn’t know it had disappeared till you told me.” The Hon. Galahad stared fixedly at him through the black-rimmed monocle. Then, with a gesture of loathing, he turned to the door, “Come, Clarence!” he said. “Are we going?” “Yes,” said tne Hon. Galahad, with quiet dignity. “There is nothing more that we can do here. Let us get ’from this house before it is struck by a thunderbolt.” 111. The gentlemanly office-boy who sat in the outer room of the Argus Enquiry Agency read the card which the stout visitor had handed to him and gazed at the stout visitor with respect and admiration. A polished lad, he loved the aristocracy. He tapped on the door of the inner office. “A gentleman to see me?’’ asked Percy Pilbeam. “A baronet to see you, sir,” corrected the office boy. “Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe Matchingham Hall, Salop.’> “Show' him in immediately,” said Pilbeam with enthusiasm. He rose and pulled down the lapels of his coat. Things, he felt, were looking up. He remembered Sir Gregory Parsloe. One of his first cases. He had been able to recover for him some letters which had fallen into the wrong hands. He wondered as he heard the footsteps outside, if his client had been indulging in correspondence again. From the baronet’s sandbagged expression, as he entered, such might well have been the case. It is the fate of Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe to come into thi s chronicle puffing and looking purple. He puffed and looked purple now.

“I have called to see you, Mr Pilbeam,” he said, after the preliminary civilities had been exchanged and he had lowered his impressive bulk into a chair, “because I am in a position i of serious difficulty.” “I am sorry to hear that, Sir Gregory. ’ ’ “And because I remember with what discretion and resource you once acted on my behalf.’’ Pilbeam glanced at the door. It was closed. He was now convinced that his visitor’s little trouble was the same as on that previous occasion, and he looked at the indefatigable man with frank astonishment. Didn’t these old bucks, he was asking himself, ever stop writing compromising letters? You would have thought they would have got writer’s cramp. “If there is any way in which I can assist you, Sir Gregory . . . Perhaps you will tell me the facts from the beginning?” “The beginning?’’ Sir Gregory pondered. “Well, let me put it this way. At one time, Mr Pilbeam, I was younger than I am to-day.” “Quite.” “ Poorer.’’ “No doubt.” “And less respectable. And during that period of my life 1 unfortunately went about a good deal with a man named Threepwood.” “Galahad Threepwood?” “You know him?” said Sir Gregory, surprised. Pilbeam chuckled reminiscently. “I know his name. I wrote an article about him once, when ? was editing a paper called Society Spice. Number One of the Thriftless Aristocrats series. The snappiest thing I ever did in my life. They tell me he called twice at the office with horsewhip, wanting to see me.” Bir Gregory exhibited concern. “You have met him, then?” ‘‘l have not. You are probably not familiar with the inner workings of a paper like Society Spice, Sir Gregory, but I may tell you that it is foreign to the editorial policy ever to meet visitors who call with horsewhips.” “Would he have heard your name?” “No. There wa 6 a very strict rule in the Spice office that the names of the editorial staff were not to be divulged.” “Ah!” said Sir Gregory, relieved. Hig relief gave place to indignation. There was an inconsistency about the Hon. Galahad’s behaviour which revolted him. “He cut up rough, did he, because you wrote things about him in your paper? And yet he doesn’t seem to mind writing things himself about other people, damn him. That’s quite another matter. A different thing altogether. Oh, yes!” '‘Does he write? I didn’t know.” “He’s writing his reminiscences at this very moment. He’s down at Blandings Castle finishing them now. And the book’s going to be full of storieg about me. That’s why I’ve come to see you. Dashed, infernal, damaging stories, which’ll ruin my reputation in the country. There’s one about some prawns . . .” Words failed Sir Gregory. He sat puffing. Pilbeam nodded gravely. He understood the position now. As to what his client expected him to do about it, however, he remained hazy. “But if these stories you speak of are libellous . . . “What has that got to do with it? They’re true.” “The greater the truth the greater the ...” “Oh I know all about that,” interrupted Sir Gregory, impatiently. “And a lot of help it’s going to be to me. A jury could give me the heaviest damages on record and it wouldn’t do me a bit of good. What about my repu-

I tation in, the country? What about knowing that every damned fool I met was laughing at me behind my back? What aoout the Unionist Committee? 1 may tell you, Mr Pilbeam, apart from auy other consideration, that I am on the point of being accepted by our local Unionist Committee as their can didate at the next election. And if that old pest’s bouk is published they | will drop me like a hot coal. Now, do you understand? ” Pilbeam picked up a pen, and with it scratched his chin thoughtfully. He liked to take an optimistic view with regard tv his clients’ affairs but he could not conceal from himself hat Sir Gregory appeared to be out of luck. “He is determined to publish this book?” “It’s the only object he’s gut in life, the miserable old fossil.” “And he is resolved to include the stories?” “He called on me this morning expressly to tell me so. And I caught the next train to London t put the matter in your hands. ' Pilbeam scratched his left cheekbone. “H’m!” he said. “Well, in the circumstances, I really don’t see what is to be done except ...” . Get hold of the manuscript and destroy it, you were about to say? Exactly, That’s precisely what I’ve come to ask you to do for me.”

Pilbeam opened his mouth, startled. He had not been about to say anything of the kind. What he had been intending to remark was that, the situation being as described, there appeared no course to pursue but to fold the hands, set the teeth, and await the inevitable disaster like a man and a Briton. He gazed blankly at this lawless Bart. Baronets are proverbially bad, but surely felt Percy Pilbeam, there was no excuse for them to be as bad as all that.

“Steal the manuscript?” ‘ * Only possible way. ’ ’ “But that’s rather a tall order, isn’t it, Sir Gregory?” “Not,” replied the baronet, ingratiatingly, “for a clever young fellow like you.” The flattery left Pilbeam cold. His distant, unenthusiastie manner underwent no change. However clever a ran is, he was thinking, he cannot very well abstract tho manuscript of a book of reminiscents from a house unless he is firgt able to enter that house. “How could I get into the place?” “I should have thought you would have found a dozen ways.” “Not even one,” Pilbeam assured him. •*L<.ok how you recovered those letters of mine. ’ ‘ “That was easy.’’ “You told them you had come to inspect -he gas meter.” “I could scarcely go to Blandings Castle and say I had come to inspect the gas meter and hope to be invited to make a long visit on the strength of it. You do not appear to realise, Sir Gregory, that the undertaking you suggest would not be a matter of a few minutes. I might have to remain in the house for quite a considerable time.” Sir Gregory found hig companion’s attitude damping. He was a man whom, since his accession to the baronetcy and its accompanying wealth, had grown accustomed to seeing people jump smartly to it when he issued instructions. He became peevish. “Why couldn’t you go there as a butler or something?” Percy Pilbeam’s only reply to this was a tolerant smile. He raised the pen and scratched his head with it. “.Scarcely feasible,” he said. And again that rather pitying smile flitted across his face. The sight of it brought Sir Gregory to the boil. He felt an irresistible desire to say something to wipe it away. It reminded him of the smiles he had seen on the faces of bookmakers in his younger days, when he had suggested backing horses with them on credit and in a spirit of mutual trust. “Well, have it your own way,” he snapped. “But it may interest you to know that to get that manuscript into my possession I am willing to pay a thousand pounds.”

It did, as he had foreseen, interest Pilbeam extremely. So much so that, in his emotion, he jerked the pen wildly, inflicting a nasty scalp wound. “A truth?” he stammered.

Sir Gregory, a prudent man in money matters, perceived that he had allowed his sense of the dramatic to carry him away.

“Well, five hundred,” he said, rather quickly. “And five hundred is a lot of money, Mr Pilbeam. ’ ’ The point was one which he had no need to stress. Percy Pilbeam had grasped it without assistance, and his face grew wan with thought. The day might come when the proprietor of the Argus Enquiry Agency would remain unmoved by the prospect of adding five hundred pounds to hig bank balance, but it had not come yet. <r A cheque for five hundred the moment that old weasel’s manuscript is in my hands,” said Bir Gregory, insinuatingly. Nature had so arranged it that in no circumstances could Percy Pilbeam’s face ever become really beautiful; but at this moment there stole into it an expression which did do something to relieve, to a certain extent, its normal unpleasantness. It was an expression of rapture, of joy, of almost beatific happiness—the look, in short, of a man who sees his way clear to laying his hands on five hundred pounds. There is about the mention of any substantial sum of money something that seems to exercise a quickening effect on the human intelligence. A moment before, Pilbeam’s mind had been an inert mass. Now, abruptly, it began to function like a dynamo.

Get into Blandings Castle? Why, of course he could get into Blandings Castle. And not sneak in, either, with a trousers-seat itching in. apprehension of the kick that should' send him out again, but bowl proudly up to the front door in his two-seater and hand his suitcase to the butler and be welcomed as the honoured guest. Until now he had forgotten, for he had deliberately set himself to forget, the outrageous suggestion of that young idiot whose name escaped him, that he should come to Blandings and hunt about for lost pigs. It had wounded his self-respect so deeply at the time that he had driven it from hig thoughts. When he found himself thinking about he had immediately pulled himself together, and started thinking about something else. Now it all came back

Ito him. And Hugo’s pa.L...g ho recalled, had been chat >1 ever he changed his mind the commission would still be open, “1 will take this case, Sir Gregory,” he said. ‘ ‘ Woof ? ” “You may rely on my being at Blandings Castle by to-morrow eventing at the latest. 1 have thought of a way of getting there.” He rose from his desk, and paced the room with knitted brows. That agile brain had beguu to work under its own steam. He paused onco to look in a distrait manner out of the window; and when Sir Gregory cleared his throat to speak, jerked an impatient shoulder at him. He could not have baronets, even with hyphens in their names, interrupting him at a moment like this. “Sir Gregory,” he said at length. “The great thing in matters like this is to be prepared with a plan. I have a plan.” “Woof!” said Sir Gregory. This time he meant that he had thought all along that his companion would get one after pacing like that. “When you arrive home to-night, I want you to invite Mr Galahad Threepwood to dinner to-morrow night.” The baronet shook like a jdlly. Wrath and amazement fought within him. Ask the man to dinner? After what had occurred? “As many others of the Blandings Castle party as you think fit, of course, but Mr Threepwood without fail. Onca he is out of the house, my path will ba clear. ’ ’ Wrath and amazement died away. The baronet had grasped the idea. The beauty aud simplicity of the stratagem stirred his admiration. But was it not he felt, a simpler matter to issue such an invitation than to get it accepted? A vivid picture rose before his eyes of the Hon. Galahad as he had last seen him. Then there came to him the blessed, healing thought of Lady Constance Kceble. He would send the invitation to her, and—yes, dash it! —he would tell her the full facts, put his cards on the table and trust to her sympathy and proper feeling to enlist her in the cause. He had long been aware that her attitude towards the reminiscenes resembled his own. He could rely on her to help him. He could also rely on her somehow —by what strange feminine modes of coercion he, being a bachelor, could only guess at—to deliver the Hon. Galahad Threepwood at Matchingham Hall in time for dinner. Women, he kuew, had this strange power over their near relations. “Splendid!” he said. “Excellent! Capital. Woof! I’ll see it’s done.” “Then you can leave the rest to me.” “You think, if I can get him out of the house, you will be able to secure the manuscript?” “Certainly. - ” Sir Gregory rose and extended a trembling hand. “Mr Pilbeam,” he said, with deep feeling, “coming to see you was the wisest thing I ever did in my life.” “Quite,’’ said Percy Pilbeam. (To be Continued).